How religion, and not patriotism, motivates the Pakistan Army

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2 days ago

The idea of patriotism never seems to have appealed to the Pakistani army, which grew up from the colonial past only to become an ideologically motivated force imagining itself as the legatee of the mediaeval Arab and Turkish armies read more
Lt Gen Ahmed Sharif, Director General Inter-Services Public Relations (DG-ISPR), Pakistan, recently stated during a press briefing in Rawalpindi that Islam was not just integral to the faith of individual soldiers but part of the army's overall training. It was a lacklustre event on May 11, which, despite being delayed by four hours, failed to produce any visual evidence to back up its tall claims and was therefore dismissed as a poor attempt to emulate India's DGMO Press Conference.
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However, Lt Gen Ahmed Sharif's claim about Islam being part of Pakistan's Army's training is undoubtedly true. Late General Zia-ul-Haq, soon after he became the Chief of the Army Staff in 1976 — informs Shuja Nawaz (2008) — changed the motto of the army from Jinnah's 'Unity, Faith, and Discipline' to 'Iman, Taqwa, Jihad fi Sabilillah' (Faith, Obedience of God, and Struggle in the Path of Allah).
Apart from encouraging commanders to join their troops in congregational prayers and elevating the regimental status of maulavis (though not with demur from old-type officers), he even allowed Tablighi Jamaat missionaries to preach at the Pakistani Military Academy (PMA) at Kakul, near Abbottabad in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. The Tablighi Jamaat preachers would deliver khutba (sermon) after Friday prayers at the PMA until 1984. In 1985, Major General Asif Nawaz prohibited their entry into the premises, stating that the place was a military academy, not a seminary (Crossed Swords: Pakistan, Its Army, and the Wars Within, P.384-385).
General Zia-ul-Haq also contributed the foreword to Brigadier SK Malik's book The Quranic Concept of War (1979). It was pithy but instructive, which might explain the current scenario.
'JEHAD FI-SABILILLAH is not an exclusive domain of the professional soldier, nor is it restricted to the application of military force alone… The professional soldier in a Muslim army, pursuing the goals of a military state, CANNOT become 'professional' if in all his activities he does not take on the 'colour of Allah'. The non-military citizen of a Muslim state must, likewise, be aware of the kind of soldier that his country must produce and the ONLY pattern of war that his country's armed forces may wage.'
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Recent evidence about the close union, the nearly complete fusion, of the constituted authority and terror network in Pakistan might appear to be a legacy of Zia-ul-Haq's policies. The visuals that have emerged from Pakistan, in the aftermath of India undertaking Operation Sindoor, are revealing. Corpses of slain terrorists were draped in the national flag of Pakistan during their last journey, with personnel of the Pakistani army and police giving them a ceremonial gun salute.
A designated terrorist, Hafiz Abdur Rauf, led the Salat-ul-Janazah (funeral prayer) flanked by senior officers of the Pakistani Army. It is an ocular proof that the boundaries between the government and terror apparatus have been somewhat blurred in Pakistan. Even the fig leaf, which previously concealed this relation, has been dropped. How to deal with such a country, at a theoretical level, should constitute a challenge for the global community. Whereas India might be the immediate victim of Pakistan's terrorism, the threat has a wider canvas.
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Pakistan's Army has two-fold origination — a) historical and b) ideological. Historically, the Pakistan Army, like its Indian counterpart, has its origin in the colonial Indian Army (or the British Indian Army). The ranks, formations, drills/manoeuvres, uniforms, badges, lifestyle/mode of recreation, etc, are a legacy of the colonial army. While this colonial army no doubt ensured the external security of India for almost two centuries, whereby notorious foreign aggressions were relegated to history, it was in no sense a national army. Not patriotism but colonial interests at home and abroad formed the motivating factor of this army. No wonder Indian battalions participated in the battles of World Wars I & II in foreign war theatres.
'As now constituted', — reads a pamphlet published by the All India Congress Committee, 'the armed forces under the Government of India are Indian in one sense only— in that their cost is borne by the people of India. In everything else they are either British or, at any rate, non-national, though an overwhelming proportion of their personnel is furnished by India' (Defence of India or Nationalisation of Indian Army, P.3). The author of the pamphlet was Nirad C Chaudhuri, who was literally an 'unknown Indian' at that time, before he became an internationally known scholar.
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The transfer of power to the domains of India and Pakistan led to the formation of two sovereign armed forces. In a sovereign nation, patriotism must replace colonial interests as the driving force of the army. Interestingly, the Azad Hind Fauz (Indian National Army) led by Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose had provided a model of a patriotic national army to Indians during World War II. The INA, which shunned racial/religious divides and formed its brigades named after national leaders, had drawn participation from Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs and Christians alike in Southeast Asia. The INA was path-breaking not just in Indian but also global contexts, which taught uniformed men and women to fight and die for the nation's independence. Love of the country was its motive force. It had directly or indirectly influenced the Indian Army as we know it today.
Major Somnath Sharma, India's first Param Vir Chakra awardee, who laid down his life combating invasion on Kashmir less than three months after independence of India, was decisively fighting for his country's security and honour. Similarly, Brigadier Mohammed Usman, who died fighting Pakistani invaders at Nausera (July, 1948) and earned the nickname 'Nausera Ka Sher' (the Tiger of Nausera), upheld the validity of patriotism over religious trapping. It is this religion-neutral patriotism that forms the motive force of the Indian Army.
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The partition of India, which accompanied the independence, led to the reorganisation of the armed forces in two dominions, viz, India and Pakistan. The Indian Army and Pakistan Army, despite their shared past, grew along different lines. India chose to have an apolitical and secular armed force where the religious or linguistic identity of a soldier was his/her private affair. The military is actuated by the principle of patriotism. The Indian Army follows an honour code –'Naam, Namak, Nishan', ie, a) name/honour of the unit/Army/Nation, b) loyalty to the nation and c) insignia flag of one's unit/regiment/army/nation. The esprit de corps, or the spirit of comradeship and brotherhood of the brave, transcends caste, creed, religion or language.
The Indian Army has had Hindu, Zoroastrian, Christian and Sikh Chiefs of Army Staff (COAS) since independence. At least once a Muslim has been at the top post of the Indian Air Force. But never have they been categorised as such.
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This would be unthinkable in Pakistan, which had not seen any Hindu commissioned officer after the 1950s. Late Major CR Dutt, who later joined Bangladesh Mukti Bahini, was one such officer.
Simultaneously, there is an ideological source of origin of the Pakistan Army, viz, Islam. Whereas it might be true General Zia-ul-Haq heralded the Islamisation of the Pakistan Army in particular and of the nation in general during his presidency, throughout which he continued to be the COAS, there were other compulsions to underscore Islam in the pre-1971 period. The idea of patriotism never seems to have appealed to the Pakistani army.
The only observation Major General Shaukat Riza could make about Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose in an official publication of the Pakistan Army was, 'The INA was headed by Subhas Chandra Bose, a former Congress President who was a rabid Hindu Brahmin' (The Pakistan Army 1947-1949, P.103). This observation was made in a chapter titled Indian National Army, though it was dealing with the Red Fort trial in particular.
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Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose — not a Brahmin, anyway — was possibly the most secular nationalist. The chapter fails to explain why many Muslims, including General Shahnawaz Khan, General M Z Kiani, etc, fought in the Indian National Army alongside Hindus and Sikhs if Subhas Bose was 'rabid Brahmin'. This is because patriotism is a virtue alien to the Pakistan army. It fights on the zeal of Islam. Its army is merely a reflection of the Pakistani state, which was founded on religious rather than racial or territorial identity.
Islam was the only glue that kept its western and eastern flanks of Pakistan together between 1947 and 1971. The eastern flank (today Bangladesh) was actually more populous than the western flank with its four provinces.
Pakistan's army would like to imagine itself as the legatee of the Arab and Turkish armies of the mediaeval ages that carried the victorious banner of Islam through non-Islamic lands. Historically, this might be preposterous because Pakistanis, whether they were Punjabis, Sindhis, Balochs, Pathans, Hazaras or Bengalis (before 1971), were not remotely connected to the Arabs, Turks or Kurds. Their forefathers, if they had converted to Islam, converted mostly under coercion to avoid the humiliation of Jiziya, if not to escape the sword of Islam on their necks. The Muslims of Pakistan were actually themselves frontline victims of historical Islamist military aggression on India. Thus, truly speaking, the garrison state of Pakistan exists not so much on the map as much as in the minds of Pakistanis.
During the 1965 War, when the Pakistan Army launched Operation 'GIBRALTAR' on August 7, 1965, to wrest Kashmir from India's control, the historical inspiration was obvious. It sought to recreate the valour of Tariq ibn Ziyad (670-718 AD), the commander of the Arab-Berber Muslim army, who invaded Spain from Morocco across the Strait of Gibraltar. The Rock of Gibraltar is a Spanish derivative of the Arabic name Jabal-Tariq, or the mountain of Tariq. It was this conquest that brought Spain under Islam's control for the ensuing seven centuries. 'The Gibraltar force'—informs the then COAS of Pakistan, viz General Mohammad Musa (1983)—'consisted of approximately 7000 Mujahidin from 'Azad Kashmir'. Most of it was given some guerrilla training within a short time before it was launched' (My Version: India-Pakistan War, 1965, P.36). General Musa admits that the operation ended in a failure. This, however, proves that there was a definite connection between the Pakistan Army and Mujahidin (terrorists) even prior to Zia-ul-Haq's era.
The names of the units in Operation Gibraltar were also revealing. Shuja Nawaz informs us that the units were named after historical Muslim military heroes, viz, Tariq (bin Ziad), (Mahmud) Ghaznavi, Salahuddin, (Mohammed bin) Qasim, and Khalid (bin Waleed). Only one unit was named Nusrat (meaning Victory) in honour of the wife of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto (Crossed Swords, P.206).
The Pakistan Army uses a prayer, which is called Tariq's prayer in honour of the aforesaid Tariq ibn Ziyad. Its English translation, as available on the website of Pakistan's Army (though not accessible from India at present), reads, 'These Ghazis, these devoted souls of your lordship/whom you have blessed with the zeal of your worship/their legions overcame deserts and rivers/and trample mountain to dust with fervour/they care not for the world's pleasure/the love of the lord are their treasures/the mission and the aim of Momim is martyrdom/not the booty of war, nor crave for a kingdom'.
This prayer proves that Pakistan's Army is not a normal national army, which, actuated by a sense of patriotism, defends the territory of a nation. It rather likes to imagine itself as the modern-day avatar of Islam's mediaeval army of conquest. In its quest it could co-opt mujahidin, an honourable term in Islam for the automatic weapon-wielding terrorists. Pakistan might like to celebrate the legacy of Islamic conquests. The question is whether such things have a place in the 21st-century world.
The writer is author of the book 'The Microphone Men: How Orators Created a Modern India' (2019) and an independent researcher based in New Delhi. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely those of the author. They do not necessarily reflect Firstpost's views.